Making sure the xen-blkfront module is being added to the initrd seems to solve the problem: # echo 'add_drivers+="xen-blkfront"' > /etc/dracut.conf.d/1-xen.conf # transactional-update -c <NEWSNAPSHOTWITHKERNEL5.14> initrd Then system can reboot into the new kernel/snapshot. Any idea what change makes this necessary? (xen)-modules not being loaded automatically anymore? Is there a better/more sensible way of doing this? And is it possible to somehow make the upgrade path smoother not breaking peoples existing systems when updating kernel? (I will try to read/understand/experiment with how to combine this with Ignition/Bootstrapping on MicroOS)